Meat pies have hitherto been packaged in paper bags or in individual transparent film packs manufactured by folded web packaging machinery. When it is desired to heat a pie it is removed from the package and placed in an oven. However if heated in a microwave oven the pie filling tends to become excessively hot and/or the pastry tends to become soggy during heating. It has been suggested to avoid or lessen this problem by heating the pastry in contact with a microwave interactive surface, which browns or toasts the pastry surface.
Some microwave interactive surfaces form part of a utensil which needs to be washed after use. Brastad (U.S. Pat. No. 4,267,420) described a disposable microwave interactive plastic film for wrapping crumbed fish piece and the like. We have found that the Brastad wrapping has a tendency to overheat, shrink and even melt in regions which are subjected to microwave energy while not in contact with the wrapped foodstuff, especially when the film is in overlapping layers each of which is heated by microwaves.
Moreover some pastry products become soggy if heated with all surfaces in contact with a plastic film without air circulation.
Other microwave interactive materials have been employed for example as a thin flat tray or sheet in the base of a carton. In that case overlapping thicknesses of microwave interactive layers are avoided and air circulation is permitted resulting in a crisp pastry. However cartons are a relatively expensive means of packaging and have other well know disadvantages.
An object of the present invention is the provision of a package in which a pie pastry product or the like may be handled in commerce, which facilitates heating of the content in a microwave oven, and which avoids or ameliorates at least some of the disadvantages of prior art.